MySpace Founder: We Had Video Chat in 2004

In a long Google+ post titled "Mark Zuckerberg's first public response to Google+," MySpace founder Tom Anderson shared some insights about the approaching rivalry between the world's currently reigning social network, Facebook, and the upstart from the search giant.

Anderson was mostly responding to Facebook's announcement of video conversations powered by Skype, and noted, without a hint of sour grapes, that MySpace had one-to-one video chat in 2004, and even had Skype-powered video calling in 2007.

Speaking of the Facebook-Skype deal, Anderson wrote, "Some pundits are complaining that the technology is not new, but that's besides the point The point is that people weren't really ready for it back then—now is the time, and FB has the userbase."

MySpace's pioneering in social-network-based video calling may surprise those who consider it a dinosaur that's only worth the pittance that investors recently paid to acquire it from News Corp. The once leading social network is arguably still a better venue for music acts to showcase their wares, with customizable page design and a richer audio player. But Anderson seems to have moved on, seemingly considering MySpace out of the social-networking war. His last post there was on March 1, while he's been quite active on Google+.

On his Facebook page, he answered basic questions about his former baby last week, saying "I get many questions about MySpace. For the record: I started MySpace in 2003, it sold in 2005 to NewsCorp for $580 million, and I stayed there to run it until April 2009. For the last 2.5 years its been run by another team, and today a new owner bought MySpace from NewsCorp. Like most of you, I'm not a fan of the new MySpace, though the team's heart was in the right place. Maybe the new owner has some good ideas."

In the more recent Google+ post, Anderson goes on to discuss the Facebook Lists and Groups versus Google+ Circles, and sums up the social-networking end game as follows: "The two are actually very similar, but each probably does certain things better than the other. Thinking about what each model does better is probably the key to unlocking what 'model' is going to 'win.'"

Michael Muchmore is PC Magazine’s lead analyst for software and Web applications. A native New Yorker, he has at various times headed up PC Magazine’s coverage of Web development, enterprise software, and display technologies. Michael cowrote one of the first overviews of Web Services (pretty much the progenitor of Web 2.0) for a general audience. Before that he worked on PC Magazine’s Solutions section, which in those days covered programming techniques as well as tips on using popular office software. Most recently he covered Web...
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